Category Archives: Land use and Environment
Katrina Wyman, ‘Public and Private Law for Decarbonisation’
INTRODUCTION For a long time, policymakers and scholars have recognised that individuals and firms, as well as governments, must act to limit climate change. For example, in a well-known 2009 working paper for the World Bank, the late Nobel Laureate Elinor Ostrom argued for a polycentric, rather than a singularly global, approach to limiting climate […]
Ekaterina Pannebakker, ‘Sustainable development clauses in international contracts through the lens of the Unidroit principles’
ABSTRACT Most transactions that leave an imprint on the environment and communities are organized by commercial contracts. However, little is known about the way in which parties reflect sustainable development in contractual clauses. How can parties to international contracts commit to respect sustainable development goals? What are the possible degrees of commitment? Which contractual mechanisms […]
Anna Beckers, ‘Private Law and the Institutional (Re)turn’
SUMMARY In times of crises and social transformations, private lawyers turn to analysis of the institutions of private law. They turn to the contract, property, tort, restitution, or corporate personhood for both identifying the root causes of societal problems and for anchoring change in the legal system. My inaugural lecture discusses this frequent (re)turn to […]
Mark Ortega, ‘Overlooking Uncommon Buildings – Fearn and others v Board of Trustees of the Tate Gallery’
ABSTRACT This Note describes the key doctrinal developments in the Fearn decision and criticises two of these developments: the use-design distinction, and the privileging of the ‘common and ordinary’ uses of land over ‘abnormal’ uses of land. This Note argues that the use-design distinction is artificial and therefore the United Kingdom Supreme Court’s effective insulation […]
Shelley Welton, ‘The Public-Private Blur in Clean Energy Siting’
INTRODUCTION The consensus is increasingly clear: to stave off catastrophic climate change requires a massive and rapid transition from fossil fuels to clean energy. This consensus is now reflected in the laws and policies of numerous countries, states and other sub-jurisdictions, many of which have established ambitious ‘100 per cent clean energy’ targets. Hitting these […]
Dalia Palombo, ‘Business, Human Rights and Climate Change: The Gradual Expansion of the Duty of Care’
ABSTRACT This article investigates how human rights considerations are increasingly shaping tort law by focusing on the gradual expansion of the duty of care in business and human rights cases. For decades, victims have attempted to hold parent companies to account for extraterritorial human rights abuses committed by their foreign subsidiaries. Recently, the Supreme Court […]
Carlarne and Hirokawa, ‘Disrupting Dominance’
ABSTRACT Climate change poses one of the greatest threats to human health and well-being. It also poses enormous challenges to the rule of law. As climate change progresses and climate impacts intensify, it becomes increasingly urgent to consider whether and how we are drawing upon the law as a tool to advance human adaptation to […]
Michele Corgatelli, ‘The Corporate Sustainability Due Diligence Directive: Outstanding Issues’
ABSTRACT This paper contextualises the origins of the due diligence process embedded in the Corporate Sustainability Due Diligence Directive and assesses how these origins are reflected in the notions of ‘adverse impact’ and its ‘severity’, ‘risk’, ‘influence’ and ‘leverage’. In analysing the new provisions, the paper highlights a number of interpretive problems and outstanding issues […]
Schwizer, Cosma and Nobile, ‘Risk Culture and Sustainability’
ABSTRACT The Chapter focuses on environmental sustainability and provides a better understanding of the corporate governance levers that can direct behaviours towards environmental goals. We explore the relationship between risk culture and board members’ intention to adopt pro-environment strategies (PES) through individual beliefs. These factors, according to Ajzen’s theory of planned behaviour (ATPB), refer to […]
Malcolm and Steenmans, ‘Transitioning towards circular systems: property rights in waste’
ABSTRACT Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to explore the impact that property rights can have on the implementation of circular waste economies, in which waste is reused, recycled or recovered, within the European Union’s Waste Framework Directive. Design/methodology/approach – A theoretical lens is applied to the legal definition as well as production […]